Ancient Nordic Runes

Character Map:

Description:

The numbers assigned to each symbol are arbitrary and are not supported by any lore. The numbers are only there to assist with discussions about the symbols and should not be taken as that symbol’s translation.

These are the Ancient Nordic Runes that only appear in the Elder Scrolls Online. It is unknown if the runes are an actual alphabet.

The exact orientation of each rune is unknown.

Symbols 1 and 2 are very similar, but are different enough to be considered different runes.

“The Nord culture hero Ysgramor, leader of a great colonizing fleet to Tamriel, is credited with developing a runic transcription of Nord speech based on Elvish principles, and so Ysgramor is considered the first human historian.”

It is highly possible that the Nordic Runes found in ESO are those mentioned in the above quote. It is odd that there are no signs of these runes in Windhelm, a city built by Ysgramor. Unfortunately, there is no known translation of the Nordic runes, but they resemble the real-life Scandinavian runes.

["Two versions of the futhark: above, the Common, or Danish runes below, the Swedo-Norwegian runes".

Oddly enough, the runes do not appear in TESV: Skyrim, though a large amount of ancient Nordic tombs from around the start of the 1st Era (like Saarthal and Ysgramor’s Tomb) still exist in the 4th Era.

Examples of Use:

[The textures used on the Nordic Rune Stones from the ESO game files.]

[A Nordic Rune Stones outside of Last Rest on Bleakrock Isle in ESO. The screenshot was taken by The Lusty Dovahkiin.]